Tried antiX Linux 19.1 and found it very interesting. Tested just the "base" gui version, which is about a CD / 650mb or so.
Rather than rehash the usual reviews, I thought I'd point out some of the things that interested me ..
1) Contains all the materials needed to retrieve and build TinyCore.
2) Based around *window managers* like ICEwm, fluxbox, JWM. Seamlessly switch between them, and a million "themes" for them all. Nicely done, although you can spend a lifetime tweaking all that.
3) Based on Debian Buster stable, which itself has an upgraded busybox included 1.30. Most users will use the default bash environment, but for playing with Tinycore scripts, I just tweak my path to put busybox first, run the ash shell and so forth if any bash-ism's peek their head out.
4) VERY pretty virtual-terminals! Not sure if I like it, but it's growing on me. I've never seen that type of virtual terminal before.
5) Aside from Firefox being the main browser, they use DILLO for some internal html documentation. Very cool. I always thought that was a great use for Dillo, even before I saw it here with my own personal docs and quick html markup.
Yeah, so no systemd. Latest kernel is 4.9, which in the past has proven to be a problem for some of my mini-pc's using old Intel Z8xxx cpu's, but it hasn't crashed yet with their custom kernel. Easy to upgrade the kernel though.
Interesting use of usb tools like remastering and zillions of persistence options. Interestingly enough, I don't consider it a "beginner's distro", although that depends on the person.
Will it replace my beloved Tiny/Pi/Dcore? NO. Different objectives, but it's clear that like TC, the devs put some love into it for their own reasons.